


Laer

by HASA_Archivist



Category: The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: First Age, Poetry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-14
Updated: 2015-04-14
Packaged: 2018-03-22 20:54:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 771
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3743255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HASA_Archivist/pseuds/HASA_Archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How *did* Turin regain his sanity? Was it simply the Ivrin, or was it something (or someone) deeper?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Laer

**Author's Note:**

> Note from the HASA Transition Team: This story was originally archived at [HASA](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Henneth_Ann%C3%BBn_Story_Archive), which closed in February 2015. To preserve the archive, we began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in February 2015. We posted announcements about the move, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this author, please contact The HASA Transition Team using the e-mail address on the [HASA collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/hasa/profile).

Premise: This is a poem about Beleg and Turin which occurs a bit after Beleg's death. Here's the catch: What *did* really cause Turin to come to his senses after killing Beleg? Was it simply the Ivrin, or was it something deeper, more meaningful?

*******************************

O'er moonlit field and quiet fen  
The form has come to walk again  
Above, the moon is full and fair  
Yet touches not his midnight hair  
One gray of eye and fair of face  
An echo of the Firstborn race  
He mourns to walk and walks to mourn  
A friend, who by betrayal torn  
Has lost himself within the fen  
To mourn who'll not come out again  
With bow of shadow, quiver white  
A bare shade of his former might  
His sadness shrouds him like a cloak  
To die for love! - 'twould be a joke  
But it is not; in freeing friend  
The form wrought his own tristful end  
And friend's as well--in killing, died:  
He sunk to madness, terrified  
Of guilt which like a summons laid  
A burden heavier than his black blade  
And now each one doth mourn the other  
Of different race, yet troth-pledged brother  
While man moans treason wrought in hate  
The Firstborn grieves his comrade's fate

**

The night is dark, all doth conceal  
Save what the wheeling stars reveal  
Below, they ripple from a mere:  
Two poor met companions camp here  
Their fire light and courage brings  
But mirrors not from the pure springs  
Which shirk in blackness from the hilt  
Of blood-stained blade, bearer of guilt  
The first is sad, but with bright eyes  
A thrall who made to enterprise  
His own escape; yet black his gaze  
When it on his companion lays  
Companion grim, soul struck with blight  
Whose eyes upon the sword alight  
And wish that it should slay him hence  
To make for wrong small recompense  
For better death than to be free  
And bear this guilt eternally

**

The form arrives at this sad scene  
And crouches by the fire unseen  
He gives no call nor speaks no hail  
Yet gazes on the dragon-mail  
Of man who was adopted kin  
And sits now mute and torn within  
No tears are shed; the form can't weep  
Nor long can he this visage keep  
For pain consumes it, sears the fair:  
The form grieves for his friend's despair  
To heal and save him, time is small  
So moves he to the man in thrall  
And wraps him in unseen embrace  
To give strength, so grief might efface

**

There is no magic in the hold  
Save that of friendship, tried and told,  
Forgiveness deep and love potent:  
The form's last strength in these is spent  
And as a river, warm with rain  
Will coax to growth a fertile plain  
And cause green roots to spring anew  
The ghost's touch warms the mortal through  
His whispers the mute ears awake  
His love the thrall of dumbness break  
And as the sun ascends the hills  
And sets to song the whip-poor-whills  
The form with smile bright departs  
While his love to his friend imparts  
A gayer change: his heart aglow  
With the last gift he'd never know  
He wakes and descends to the mere  
And makes a song of homage here  
And this he sings without constraint  
Nor fear of capture, foe, or feint  
Then by the spring he weeps freely  
And drinks a toast to memory  
Of friend faithful to his last breath  
Who gave for him his life---and death

****

And so among the beechwoods green  
Beside the Ivrin's silver sheen  
The man called Turin, weeping, praised  
His friend, and to the sky he raised  
His supplication to the dawn:  
Sleep well, Beleg Cuthalion!

*************************************

A/N: Explanation (for those who didn't understand the poem): Ok, this was basically my version of what happened to Turin to break his madness after he killed Beleg. Sure, Tolkien says it took the waters of the Ivrin plus some consoling from Gwindor---I, however, like to think there was more to it than that. Say Beleg's spirit, right before it departed for Mandos, saw Turin's grief and wished to break it, to give him a final gift, and in that gift of spell-breaking compassion to waste all of his spirit "energy"? Basically, Beleg not only gives his *life* for Turin---he gives his *death*, too. That's what I meant in the 7th to last line. I love that idea---of a friendship so strong and so utterly selfless that it transcends death. I consider the Gimli/Legolas friendship to be this way, and I love it every time Tolkien includes these type of relationships.


End file.
